


Impasse

by TrinesRUs



Series: Transformers: To Destroy [2]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Class Issues, Eye Trauma, Gen, Pre-War to War, characters to be added as they appear
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-18
Updated: 2016-03-22
Packaged: 2018-04-09 21:37:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4365098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrinesRUs/pseuds/TrinesRUs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perceptor is your slightly-better-than-average scientist living in the controlled, completely peaceful, not at all starting to crack Cybertron under the caste system. He has absolutely nothing to complain about: certainly not the treatment of his friends, and certainly not some of the experiments his peers are undertaking. Everything is okay, and society definitely isn't close to breaking into war. And he most certainly isn't about to endanger his own function to undermine the caste system that definitely isn't harming anyone...</p><p>What could possibly give anyone an idea like that?</p><p>Each part of the <em>Transformers: To Destroy</em> series can be read independently, but <em>Tenets of the Dusk's Lucidity</em> is recommended reading for the rest of the series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Fate, If You Believe in Such a Concept...

**Author's Note:**

> A lot of the universe gets explained within the story (or stories if you choose to read the rest of the series) itself, but here are a few notes.
> 
> Cybertronians are genderless, but canon characters are referred to by the pronouns they are given in canon. OCs are arbitrarily assigned masculine and feminine pronouns. Most of the OCs that will appear in this fic are just the ones surrounding Mirage and Moonracer that Perceptor happens to encounter because of the overlap in their stories.
> 
> Yes, Finesse uses female pronouns despite being referred to as "Lord" and Moonracer's "Sire."
> 
> Mechs are sometimes distinguished as being "sparked" or "commissioned." Sparked mechs are produced through spark-merge creating a newspark that is later joined with a protoform and slowly upgraded. Commissioned mechs may be either "protoformed" (a spark from Vector Sigma joined with a protoform and upgraded more quickly) or "constructed" (a spark from Vector Sigma joined with a pre-constructed frame and little need for upgrade). The class issues involved are more important for other stories in this universe, but the terms are still thrown around in this fic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Edit 1/31/16:** The first six chapters of this fic are going to be going through various degrees of revision. This chapter has been edited, and the others will have notices added to them when they have been edited as well.

            When Greenlight sat down at their usual table that mid-sol break, Perceptor could immediately tell that something tremendous had happened. The particular tilt of her smile was one she only wore on one of four occasions: 1) she had made an important break-through on her research, 2) _Lancer_ had made an important break-through on her research, 3) Perceptor had made a mistake, or 4) she had just stolen one of his rust sticks. Considering the facts that he had no rust sticks on him at the time and that his calculations were flawless, he could ascertain that it meant success on either Greenlight’s or her conjunx’s part.

            Lancer’s own sheepish grin as she joined them was answer enough. “Congratulations, Lancer,” Perceptor said in place of greeting. “To what do we owe our jubilation?”

            The purple and orange mech dropped her faceplate towards the table. With the particular tint of her faceplate, her blush was barely visible, but it was there. Perceptor beamed, but waited for her to speak on her own. “The results of my evaluation came back.”

            He was stunned. “You were selected for caste recategorization?”

            “She’s going to be an Elite Guardsmech,” confirmed Greenlight. “Can you believe it?”

            “I can hardly believe they’re letting anyone change castes,” said Perceptor. “It has happened before, mind you, but normally under sudden circumstances or a twist in fate—if you believe in such a concept. To begin allowing small numbers to _apply_ for this switch seemed beyond conception until it was announced.”

            If any of them had to guess when it began, they would all point back to Prince Starscream of Vos expressing interest in astronomy. For an orbital cycle afterwards, there had been little else than discussions of this statement, whether it was the curiosity of a sheltered mech or something more sinister.

            What really made the news explode, however, was when one interviewer pointed out that a Seeker’s engines were not suited for space travel. Prince Starscream had raised his chin and proclaimed, “The average Seeker’s, perhaps, but I am no average Seeker.” Debate ranged from whether or not he was confessing to being an outlier to whether enhanced speed even counted as an outlier ability on a Seeker frame or if he just had the resources for better engines to if he was solely speaking from pride.

            Regardless of Prince Starscream’s thought process, it had started a wave of protest against the “spark caliber determines caste” rhetoric that had been the norm for decavorns. If a royal could long for the Intellectual caste, why couldn’t any other mech decide he was better suited elsewhere? And just when it looked to be on the brink of a riot, the High Council came forward to propose a limited caste mobility trial.

            Lancer, having always felt a little large even for an NMR spectrometer, had been one of the first to sign up. “Training in two solar-cycles. I have until then to upgrade my armor.” She had a tendency to focus on the practical side of matters when she was proud of something; she wasn’t fond of boasting. But Greenlight and Perceptor knew how much being accepted to the Elite Guard in particular was important to her without her having to say a word about it.

            “You’re going to be splendid,” Greenlight assured her. “My Lancer, defending the fine leaders of Nova Cronum.” She leaned over her energon cube to kiss her conjunx.

            Lancer fidgeted for a moment before taking her conjunx’s servos in hers. “I never want to be apart from you. I want this to be a step for both of us, not me leaving you behind.” She pulled their joined servos to her chestplate. “Greenlight, will you bond with me?”

            Perceptor moved their cubes to avoid them being knocked over as Greenlight lunged into Lancer’s lap. He was half convinced they might expose their spark chambers right then and there, but he was a rational mech and knew that his friends had more decorum than that. Still, it felt appropriate to leave them with some semblance of privacy. He congratulated them both again and took his own cube back to his office.

            The rest of his break was spent designing a lesson plan for his student. Every mega-cycle, in his time off, Perceptor tutored an Urayan noble’s sparkling. Most of the time, she seemed to pay little mind to his lessons. He could never be certain how much of what he said actually reached her, but he was always eager to share his knowledge. Receiving greater freedom of travel was a side benefit.

            As soon as he was done at the lab for the sol, he cleaned up his projects and headed for the shuttle station. It was a short flight from Nova Cronum to Uraya, just a couple of joors’ jump over a corner of Iacon. Perceptor usually spent this time reading a datapad, whether the most recent update of a series he was following, research for work, or just some title that happened to catch his optic. As this journey was one he made often, he felt less inclined than other passengers did to peer out the window, but he did enjoy the view on occasion. It was fascinating to watch each style of architecture fade into the next, gold turning to silver to copper, the scattered crystal structures between. It was a testament to Cybertronian achievement.

            Perceptor loved the architectural contrast between Nova Cronum and Uraya especially. Nova Cronum was built in straight, rigid shapes. The laboratory Perceptor worked in, in particular, was a triangular structure with a pyramidal roof. Buildings fit together like puzzle pieces; varied in shape but ultimately orderly. Roads always led straight. Uraya, meanwhile, was known for its tall, elegant curves. Its towers and shops were sprawled out like a beauteous frame, with winding streets that spiraled up to some of the highest points. Both were glory to behold, but Nova Cronum was built for reason while Uraya was built for poetry.

            “Thank you for the safe journey,” he said to the shuttle as he disembarked. It wasn’t common for mechs to remember that their transport vehicles were also living mechs, so he made it a point to make sure the shuttle knew he appreciated their service.

            From the shuttle station, it was a walk to the manor in which his student resided, through the gardens and up the tower to the room where his student’s Sire was giving her an etiquette lesson. Perceptor knocked on the doorframe to signal his presence. Lord Finesse drew her lesson to a close and granted him entry to the room. She started to leave Perceptor with the young Lady Moonracer then, but he stopped her.

            “Before you depart, Lord Finesse, I was hoping you might approve this cycle’s lesson plan. I wish to explain elective kinship and spark bonding to her, but I was uncertain if you believe her mature enough for the subject.”

            Lord Finesse glanced at Moonracer. “Mirage may be a better judge of her development, but I believe she should be sufficiently advanced in her programming for the lesson to proceed.”

            “Thank you. Rest assured that I had an alternative had this one proved unfavorable, but this is the greatest lesson I could possibly give at present.”

            “Your assurance is appreciated, but unnecessary,” she said. “My conjunx and I trust you completely with our sparkling’s education.”

            “You pay me the highest compliment,” replied Perceptor. Lord Finesse nodded and excused herself from the room. Moonracer sat higher in her seat than usual but a miniscule degree, evidently intrigued by this exchange. Perceptor smiled at her. “Shall we begin?

            “A spark, as you are well aware, is the core of our functions and abilities. It encompasses our lives and identities at the most fundamental level and shapes the frames and careers we are suited for. This is the basis of our caste system: the form that suits a spark determines the duties a mech may be able to fulfill. But the spark interacts in ways not merely limited to vocation.

            “There is nothing more intimate than sharing one’s spark with another. Opening one’s spark chamber in front of someone else means that you have complete faith in your life with them, both in that they would be willing to preserve it and in that you would allow them to see your deepest vulnerabilities and values. Willfully exposing one’s spark to anyone takes tremendous trust, and few make that step outside of medical emergencies.”

            Perceptor took a break to ensure that his student was still following the lesson. Moonracer’s pauldrons were more slouched than before, but she had not yet dropped her attention altogether. He took this as a good sign and continued the lesson.

            “Joining sparks with another mech or mechs can take a temporary or permanent form: spark-merging or spark-bonding. Spark-merging is bringing two or more sparks together physically, touching them to produce a surge of energy. When combined with another energy-surging activity, it can result in the production of a newspark, like yourself. Spark-bonding involves spark-merging with the intention of exchanging a portion of one’s spark with a mech or set of mechs one loves deeply.

            “Bondmates formed through this exchange experience great benefits and risks. Having that connection means only being alone when you want to be, even if one’s bondmate is not in the vicinity. It means never having to wonder after the other’s well-being because one can sense one’s bondmate’s status immediately without inquiry being necessary. However, one can also sense when one’s bondmate’s spark has extinguished, and the pain is said to be so severe that it may kill one to experience it. As such, spark-bonding is rare. Choosing to go through with it is essentially a statement of not wanting to live without one’s partner.

            “However, for those unwilling to risk their lives, there are milder forms of elective kinship. For romantic love, mechs may register as conjunges endurae. For platonic love, mechs may register as amica endurae. Both involve taking an oath of fidelity and filing forms for legal acknowledgement of the relationship, and either may claim legal and financial benefits from their partner or partners.”

            Again, he paused to gauge her reaction. Her optics had dimmed. He frowned. “Lady Moonracer, would it aid you to stand for the duration of this lesson instead?”

            She jumped up before the question was through and started to stretch.

            “Do you have any questions before we resume?”

            Moonracer paused with her back bent back at an angle that would be completely impossible if she had reached the armor upgrade stage of her programming. “Actually, yeah.” She straightened her spinal strut and started circling her arms. “Is it possible to feel a spark connection without bonding? Because sometimes I can feel when Carrier’s upset.”

            “Actually, yes! A full spark connection as formed between bondmates is merely the strongest possible bond. Seeker trines form a milder bond meant to streamline flight synchronization. Sparked mechs like yourself often feel a faint connection with their Carriers because of the time spent developing in their creator’s spark chambers, though this often fades by the time final upgrades are acheived. Why, the second strongest connection is possibly between split-spark twins, but contrasting the loss of a bondmate, the death of a twin is documented as causing acute pain followed by _improved_ health and strength. The spark works in mysterious ways.”

            Seeing that she had no further questions, Perceptor clapped his servos together. “Now, to return to our previous topic, conjunx and amica endura are more common than bondmates, but still relatively rare. Joining together as conjuges is found most commonly among the nobility and royalty as forming ties of influence and inheritance is considered an important duty. Amica endurae without conjuges are less common among these groups because amica do not maintain the right to commission or spark newbuilds together as conjuges do.

            “This is only one way conjuges endurae and amica endurae differ. For another, if a mech has both amica and conjunx endurae, emergency medical decisions are made solely by the conjunx unless specifically arranged otherwise or if the conjunx is in such a condition that they cannot make a decision. Amica endurae may, however, co-own businesses, share and inherit property from one another, and assist in raising newsparks after they have been commissioned or sparked.”

            Perceptor left that lecture feeling as though he may have actually left an impression on his pupil for once. It may not have been anything spectacular and life-changing, but the very fact that she listened and asked questions suggested that they were making progress. Hopefully, this meant that he could get her to actively engage with her education before her final upgrades.

            All in all, he was feeling very peaceful and satisfied with his life. His friends were taking a new step in their relationship; his student was learning; his work on inventing a matter replicator was nearing completion. What did he have to complain about? Why, a noble had paid him a compliment, and there was rarely much hope of that!

            Truthfully, that everything was going so right should have warned him that everything would soon go wrong. Life never liked letting the peace settle unless it was preparing to annihilate it. But Perceptor didn’t put much stock in fatalism, and he put even less in the philosophy espoused by Dead End.

            When he walked into the lab the following sol, everything seemed quieter than usual. Not chilling, but odd. With Lancer off at training, it meant one less frame in the building, but she was not one of their louder personalities to begin with. Had it been Brainstorm who had left instead, it might have made sense. As it was, he simply attributed it to the sense one has whenever there is a new chapter in one’s life.

            That changed when he saw Greenlight. She was trying to keep her faceplate impassive, but there was the touch of a grimace on her lip components that she couldn’t hide. Even if he hadn’t been attuned to the quirks of her expression, however, there was no concealing that one of her pointy audial fins was bent outwards.

            “What happened?” asked Perceptor, keeping his voice low as to avoid being overheard.

            Greenlight instinctively touched her audial fin. “It was nothing. This is just…the outcome of a less than pleasant encounter.”

            “That would be understatement. Someone did this intentionally.”

            “Maybe.” She jerked her helm in another direction, suggesting they continue their conversation on the move. “There are...certain mechs of undeniable authority…who were not happy with the arrangement Lancer and I have. Apparently, no one had thought to ask about conjuges endurae in the caste reassignment survey.”

            “So they injured you in retaliation for their own oversight?”

            “No. They discussed severing our connection for that. Eventually, it was agreed that the connection could remain with limited rights because it was assumed that Lancer’s spark and mine were suited for the same caste when we registered. What earned retaliation was when I dared to suggest that I could _bond_ with her.” She smiled bitterly. “Apparently, attempting to taint a Noble caste mech’s spark with mine would qualify as treason. Because it was only a suggestion, they let me off with a warning.”

            Emotions stirred within his frame. There were a lot of things Perceptor wanted to say in response to this news, but he was far too intelligent to say them. If Greenlight wanting to bond with her conjunx was grounds for receiving a bent audial, there was so much more he could earn for speaking his processor. Instead, he said, “And could you not prove that you were worthy of being a noble yourself?”

            Greenlight shook her helm. “Look at me, Percy. My frame isn’t suitable for joining the Elite Guard, and I don’t have the credits to buy a position in high society. I can’t trace my lineage back to some heroic figure. I’m just me. Besides, I love my test tubes too much.”

            “Would you like to reword that?”

            “All I am trying to say is that I cannot see myself abandoning the pursuit of scientific truth, nor could I deny the love of my life the pursuit of her own happiness.” Her expression fell into something that might have been gentle and might have been tired. “You know as well as I do that Lancer has never been completely comfortable here. I could never force her to come back just to suit my own selfish needs.”

            He wanted to ask her if it was really selfish, but the words died on his glossa. It was dangerous to speak like that. Perceptor was sure that what Greenlight was saying was far from how she felt, but she was being safe. There were things you just didn’t say when higher mechs could be listening, and they were always listening. They had audials everywhere.

            “I am…in admiration of your discretion and abnegation,” Perceptor managed to say. “It is also commendable for you to accept your warning so readily. We should all hope to behave the same if we make mistakes.” Meanwhile, he was certain his circuitry was starting to burn.


	2. The Labs are for Experimenting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friendship, rough nights, and— _what the frag was that_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Edit 1/31/16:** Revised this chapter.

            “Thank you for having me as a guest,” said Perceptor, setting his energon cube on the table in front of him.

            “Well, the recent development in our functions does not mean we have to lose our sense of civility,” Greenlight replied. “If anything, I would consider it more important than ever.”

            “I believe you have surpassed expectations.”

            “Not at all. Here, let me get you more chrome-alloy cake.” Greenlight reached for the tray, but Lancer snatched it away. “Dearspark, you know it’s not befitting of your new station to serve—” Lancer kissed her fingers to shush her and took the tray back to the kitchen. Greenlight chuckled.

            Perceptor might have almost been fooled into thinking things were normal. “How are you holding up?”

            “I think the Council might have a collective spark attack if they knew what goes on around here. Lancer has doted on me since we got the…”

            “Cease and desist order.”

            “Change in plans,” said Greenlight. “I think she feels guilty, but I can’t get her to see that nothing about this is her fault.”

            “And what about _you?_ How are _you_ feeling?” He braced his forearms on the table and leaned across towards her, giving her a serious look.

            “I’m fine. I’ll be fine. They can regulate how we interact publicly, but not even Zeta Prime himself could change how our relationship operates in our home. I just wish it didn’t come with quite so many examinations.” She pressed a palm to her chestplate. “I don’t think I’ve had this many spark scans since Glyph found out Lancer and I were dating.”

            “To be fair, I have heard enough about why you would ‘miss your test tubes’ if deprived of them. Such measures, on Glyph’s part, hardly seem unwarranted.”

            “Hey, the labs _are_ for experimenting.”

            Lancer nearly fumbled the tray when she reentered the room. She was sporting the brightest blush Perceptor had ever seen on her, though even that only meant a light pair of blue splotches on her faceplate. Her optics darted about the room as she set the cake squares down. “So…” She cleared her vocalizer. “Any new developments on your research?”

            “My matter replicator is entering a new round of testing tomorrow. If its operation proves satisfactory, then final adjustments can be made and production may begin on duplicates for wider usage. Granted enough time afterwards, I may complete and submit my proposal to examine a potential genetic link between Corrodia Gravis and the common rust rash.”

            “You know Percy: he always has a servo in every petroleum pie.”

            “I wouldn’t phrase it in that manner. I merely enjoy broadening my scope of intellectual endeavors. The universe offers a multifarious profusion of quandaries to be explored. Why should I impose limits on unravelling an unlimited mystery?”

            “To save some mystery for the rest of us to unravel.”

            “The universe is infinite. There is more than enough for all to investigate without having to confine my efforts.”

            “Miss this,” Lancer mumbled, staring at the table. “Maybe I should come back.”

            Greenlight’s expression soured. Perceptor tensed. “You aren’t missing anything,” said Greenlight, tone just short of a photovoltaic cat’s claws protracting. “You just like the way Perceptor and I banter. We can do plenty of that if we just remember to invite him over more often.”

            Lancer’s lip components tightened, but she didn’t look up or back down. “Can’t invite him over every sol, and I don’t get to see him every sol anymore either.”

            “But the answer is not to make any drastic changes to our functions, especially when we’re still adjusting to the last major shift.”

            “Maybe that shift just needs to be undone.”

            “After you’ve finally gotten rid of the constant pain in your spinal strut from all that crouching the labs made you do? The pain that left you unable to move sometimes when you were off shift? That I used to rub oil in just for you to be able to power down each night-cycle?”

            “New function still comes with its aches and pains.”

            “Stiff pauldrons and a few new dents, Lancer!” she cried, grabbing her conjunx by her gorget. “Leaps and bounds away from the agony I had to see you in before! I’m not going to let you go through all the trouble of changing your plating and alt.-mode _again_ to come back to a place where you’re miserable just because a few little inconveniences like not being able to bond sprang up.”

            “I _told_ you, I never wanted this to be me leaving you behind,” Lancer growled, grabbing Greenlight’s wrists. “They want to drive you away from me. Where does it end? Bending your audial? Pricking your optics out? Your spark? If I can’t be with you, I’d rather not _be_ at all.”

            Greenlight slammed her helm against Lancer’s with a force that made Perceptor feel like he rattled with the impact. Lancer didn’t even flinch. “Don’t say that,” Greenlight demanded, even as her optics flickered with pain. “We’re still together, even if I can’t feel you in my spark.

            “But if you try to switch your caste again, just when mechs are starting to question the system?” She started trembling, and Lancer pulled her into her arms. “The Council will use you as their tool, one way or another. They’ll consider it abandoning your post on the Elite Guard and have you tried for treason. They’ll force you through a psychological evaluation to see what kind of mech would try to turn from scientist to Elite Guardsmech and back. They’ll hold you as an example of what happens when mechs try to step beyond their assigned caste, use you to claim their system isn’t complete molten slag!”

            Perceptor had been trying to stay out of their exchange until then, but Greenlight’s proclamation startled him. “Greenlight! The Council—”

            “Can’t hear frag all of what we’re saying right now. What? You think we can’t scan our own home for covert mics and remote transmitters?”

            “I _am_ aware, but with the volume we have achieved, mightn’t the neighbors hear and report suspicious political discussion?”

            “Soundproofed the walls,” said Lancer.

            He relaxed. “I might have appreciated being informed sooner.”

            “Because you show so much restraint when there _is_ risk of someone overhearing,” said Greenlight.

            “I am not one to exclaim criticisms of the government in a public setting. I do have wisdom and a sense of self preservation. However, the adjustments to your accommodations might have made for substantially more cathartic conversation.”

            “The alterations mean less worry about outbursts being overheard, but I didn’t want us to get too free with our words.” Greenlight let go of Lancer and slid back into her own seat. “That might invite accusations that we’re holding anti-Council meetings in here. There are still ways of others finding out parts of our conversation, even without wires and flimsier walls.”

            “I was thinking of _you_. Is the possibility of a bond between you two truthfully so threatening that spark scans are necessary every solar-cycle?”

            Greenlight and Lancer glanced at each other. Lancer fidgeted with the cake tray while Greenlight explained, “They’re not scanning for a bond, Percy. They’re scanning for a newspark.”

            Perceptor felt as though his core temperature had dropped suddenly, though his HUD informed him that he was operating normally. Sparklings between mechs of different castes was strictly forbidden because castes were dependent on the worth a spark was determined to have. Sparklings, as a rarer form of spark production than release from Vector Sigma, were determined to carry the same value as their creators, giving rise to the common wisdom, “A mech born of two castes has none.” If a sparkling came from two different castes, it was deemed impossible for the qualities of each caste to be split in such a way that the sparkling could be reliably placed anywhere. The sparkling would literally have no place in their society.

            On its own, the reasoning wasn’t so unsettling, though it was unsound. If sparks could be measured and categorized, then sparklings should be no different. Sparklings did take longer than protoformed or constructed mechs to be matched with potential alt.-modes, but that only drew attention to the arbitrary nature of matching alt.-mode to caste. Only scientific equipment alts were consistently placed in the same caste.

            But if there was anything to be said of the Council, it was that they were unmatched in their ability to instill fear. Rumors would arise, every so often, of some youngling dragged, kicking and screeching, from their home when the truth of their creation was revealed. Other times, it was of mechs strapped down and forced through a full systems flush. Some mechs claimed that the hisses of air in the night-cycle were actually the weak screams of these poor sparks. Perceptor usually didn’t buy into it, but living alone and being compelled out of recharge some off shifts by sudden influxes of mental stimulation could make even a rational mech more susceptible to myths.

            They remained quiet for several kliks out of reverence for the somber topic. Lancer, surprisingly, was the first to break the silence with a low hum. Her optic ridges were creased, and she had a servo over her intake, with her thumb rubbing a cable in her neck. “Our home isn’t wired,” she said at last, “but Perceptor’s could be.”

            Greenlight leapt to her pedes immediately. “Right! They may not be monitoring us directly, but they could try to watch us through him.” Her voice faded as she rushed out of the room. She returned soon after with a small device, easily hidden in a single servo, which she handed off to Perceptor. “Don’t scan everything at once. Just a little when you can pass it off as normal movement. If there are cameras or anything around, you don’t want them to know you know they’re there.”

            “Meaning you can’t take down any spy tech you do find,” said Lancer.

            “But give us a sign if you find anything. It’s better we know where the limits of our safe zone lie.”

            As it happened, his front rooms were bugged to the Pit and back. His berthroom was completely free, at least, but that was all he could check with any sense of stealth that night-cycle. He would have to check his personal library at a later time.

            Recharge was elusive and uneasy. The wheeze of air escaping the planet’s surface kept sending pinpricks through his plating.

            He was alert enough to make it through the trials and adjustments on his matter replicator the next sol, but there was no denying that he was tired. Greenlight picked up on it immediately, but he reassured her with the best smile he could manage. He was not so worn down from a single night-cycle’s recharge lost that he couldn’t handle himself.

            It wasn’t until he had spent several kliks staring at an error message that he realized just how much his systems were lagging. On a normal sol, he could have skimmed over the note and found a workaround in moments. This time, however, he slogged through words that should have been simple only to find out that the source he had been trying to access was unavailable.

            Perceptor had seen the message before, and it was more of a nuisance than a serious impediment. It just meant that, instead of accessing the data tracks he required remotely through his own computer, he would need to find the physical datapads in the library of resources for the appropriate scientific branch. In this case, he needed to go to the epidemiology section of the biology department’s library.

            He rounded the next corner just in time to see a cloth-covered bulk being wheeled into one of the emptier labs. Part of his processor pinged a warning to mind his own business, but between the recharge deprivation and the door jamming at half-closed, the instinct was swallowed by his curiosity. He crept over and peered into the lab.

            The scientist inside whipped the cover off the gurney, revealing the mass underneath to be a brightly-colored frame. It was strapped down tighter than the typical uncooperative patient. Even the antennae protruding from its kibble were fastened together. The chassis was roughly the size of a fully upgraded mech’s, if more spindly-limbed and with at least twice as many arms as usual. Spines covered its plating, especially its shoulders, forearms, and shins.

            With a surprising lack of care, the scientist pulled his subject’s helm back and jammed a needle in an energon line. The creature’s magenta optics had barely dimmed before the scientist began carving through its thick chestplate. When the armor was peeled back, the distinctive blue glow of a spark spilled into the lab.

            A servo slammed the wall next to Perceptor’s audial, jolting him out of his stupor and making the door snap closed. Perceptor turned around slowly and found himself being stared down by Jhiaxus. “I don’t recall Deluge requesting you for observation.”

            “E-exuse me, I didn’t mean to pry. I was merely sidetracked on my way to the library.”

            “It would do you well to keep your optics on where you are going and out of other mechs’ business.”

            “Yes, sorry.” Perceptor ducked under Jhiaxus’ arm and scurried off down the hall.

            There were three things Perceptor knew about Insecticons. One, they were said to live in dark, harsh environs where the light from Alpha Centauri couldn’t reach, like the caves bordering the Rust Sea. Two, they were believed not to have sparks or higher cognitive functions. And three, Insecticons were not supposed to exist at all.


	3. A Precise Inversion of the Norm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The phrase, "Girls, girls, you're both pretty," was probably invented specifically with Greenlight and Brainstorm in mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll try to keep this note as "person who stumbles upon this fic in the far future"-friendly as possible, but basically, there was an unexpected hiatus between chapters 2 and 3. During that time, Lancer and Greenlight were introduced in the IDW comics. As such, if their characters in this fic don't align with the comics, that's because all we had to go off for them in canon before was that they were scientists, Lancer was too shy to live out her dream of joining the Elite Guard, and that Greenlight needed a personal loss to make her realize she had stakes in a conflict.
> 
> That said, I'm extremely excited to see more of them, even if they're really different from how I write them (and that they appear to be girlfriends in canon, too)!
> 
>  **Edit 1/31/16:** This chapter has been revised.

            Despite iconographic evidence of their existence alongside early Cybertronian life, Insecticons were deemed mythological creatures in officially sanctioned history tracks. Unlike sparkeaters or lantern lurkers, however, Perceptor had always suspected there was something more to Insecticons. Anyone could produce anecdotes about some creature or another, but the ones about Insecticons always somehow seemed more earnest.

            As a scientist, he shouldn’t have been taken in by any story, regardless of how compelling, but his reasons for suspicion didn’t end with hearsay. Physical evidence of other creatures would prove hoaxes after testing, but Insecticon eggs, kibble, and whole frames had an alarmingly high rate of being “misplaced” or “accidentally” destroyed. He would have given his life’s savings to examine the pieces himself, and the apparent clumsiness of those handling them had always frustrated him.

            Now, Perceptor could only conclude that some higher authority—whether the scientific guild, the Council, or the Prime himself—was intentionally covering up Insecticons’ existence. He was unsure where Jhiaxus and Deluge fit into this, whether they were acting on the part of this higher power or against them. Either way, their purpose remained yet unseen. With the reaction Jhiaxus had to his accidental spying, Perceptor could not surmise it to be a pleasant one.

            The question remained where to take this suspicion. Directly asking Jhiaxus or Deluge was out of the question, but there were ways he could get around that. Normally, he could strike up conversation with the director overseeing their experiment and coax the details out gradually. But when even that wasn’t a viable option, he could still persuade someone for the information.

            Namely, the someone bothering Greenlight during their mid-sol break. “Just saying, I could assemble a sonic weapon that’s powered by off-key singing from the nearest bar—in half a joor with my optics powered down.”

            “Gee, Brainstorm,” Greenlight drawled, “I’m thrilled by your obvious regard for proper safety protocols.”

            “I’m sorry; were you expecting safety with your weapons of mass destruction?” retorted Brainstorm. “Because I was commissioned to create machines that go boom in progressively bigger, more precise, and-slash-or more creative ways.”

            “And I’m certain the mechs who will be operating these monstrosities will be so pleased when your inventions ‘go boom’ in their faceplates because you were assembling blind.”

            “Fine. You aren’t impressed with skill in violence—weird, considering your conjunx. Your delicate sensibilities are offended. I get it. How about a machine that makes the spoken word visible? Floating, brightly colored text so you never have to ask someone to repeat themselves again.”

            “Finally, something practical. I’m sure this will work so much better than voice-to-text features on a datapad and with no negative consequences whatsoever for the visually sensitive. This is a completely unobstructive idea Brainstorm. Wow.”

            Perceptor could have just stood by the energon dispenser and let them keep at it, but his cube was filling up, and he had work and a personal mission to complete. He estimated they could probably only complete another handful of lines of dialogue in the time he had to walk from the dispenser to their usual table.

            “Think of it, Greenlight. Haven’t you ever been confused by a thick accent or the slurred speech of a mech who’s overcharged out of his processor? What if each word was colored to match tone, so you never had to guess at intent?”

            “And the solution is to create absolute optic-sores of word balloons to drift around, distracting you from every other sensory input? Gee, sign me up immediately. It’s not like every use you could think up for such a ridiculous device already has a practical solution, like E.M.-fields and compact decoding devices. No, I’d rather wade through a room full of mechs’ personal conversations.”

            The look in Brainstorm’s optics almost made Perceptor regret interrupting them. He was certain Brainstorm was on the cusp of revealing something that could render EM-fields moot, but it was too late. His presence had already disrupted the flow of their exchange. It was probably for the best: Brainstorm could be restrained with his information when he felt like it, and he would be more willing to disperse one secret when he hadn’t already unveiled another.

            “I hope I’m not disturbing the two of you,” said Perceptor as he took his seat.

            “Not at all,” said Greenlight. “Brainstorm was stunning me with his boundless wit.”

            “And Greenlight was just reminding me that she has a bigger stick rammed up her aft than you do.”

            “What I keep up my aft is my business, and it’s probably a lot more fun than you’re having.”

            “I find it surprising that the pair of you would bother to converse with one another to begin with,” Perceptor interrupted before they could start up again. “I was not under the delusion that you enjoy one another’s company.”

            “Yeah, well, this one came from mandate from above,” said Greenlight. “The guild wanted Brainstorm to fix the Enforcer’s acid pellet guns so either the guns wouldn’t wear down as quickly or the ammo wouldn’t activate until it’s safely out of the barrel. I got dragged in because they know better than to trust him without a chemical expert to sparkling-sit him.”

            Brainstorm scoffed. “I know chemicals, and I can handle myself just fine. I doubt it’s _me_ they need watched.”

            Perceptor cleared his vocalizer before Greenlight could figure out a way to deactivate Brainstorm with her optics. She raised her energon to her lipplates and took several large gulps, her grip on the cube tighter than necessary. To his credit, Brainstorm had a flash of something that could have been interpreted as regret in his optics, but he did not take back his statement, nor could he have if he had made the effort.

            “I trust Greenlight’s methods and judgement almost as completely as I trust my own,” said Perceptor, “and I am certain that any project with her involvement will be worthwhile.”

            His words were at once truthful and delivered with a hidden blade. Brainstorm’s need for acknowledgement, the very quality that had started his verbal battle with Greenlight, was an obvious vulnerability. It pained Perceptor to be anything but plain with his intent, but Brainstorm was more likely to talk if he was trying to impress someone.

            “Her involvement is barely more than a consulting position,” argued Brainstorm. “Not even that because ‘consultant’ implies I actually need her help.”

            “Frankly, a chemist seems a better fit for a project that involves acid and its reactions with other materials than a weapons expert, regardless of whether the intent is to design weaponry or not.”

            “This is _my_ project, assigned to _me_. Greenlight was an afterthought. I can figure out simple chemical reactions on my own, and it matters that it’s a weapon. She’s a pacifist who doesn’t know scrap about configuring a gun.”

            “It appears to me that Greenlight’s involvement was considered vital. The guild wouldn’t have assigned her to the task if they didn’t deem it necessary. Or are you questioning their decisions?” Perceptor asked. Greenlight gave him a sharp look, but he ignored it. He was sure she would understand before long.

            “Assigning weapon development to a scientist who works with weapons is a simple requirement,” he continued. “Involving a scientist who has proven to use consistent adherence to proper research procedure and documentation is common sense. I would presume it was the same logic for partnering Jhiaxus and Deluge.”

            “You undermine _my_ work, but you bring up Deluge and Jhiaxus? _Ha_ ,” said Brainstorm. “They’re just handling a side study for one of my projects while I’m tied up with this.”

            That surprised Perceptor, but he tried to clamp down on his reaction. “Oh? And what project could be so important that a distinguished processor like Jhiaxus would answer to you?”

            “If you don’t know, you don’t need to know.” Had his mouth been visible, Brainstorm probably would have been smirking. It was likely Perceptor had not been as successful in hiding his expression as he hoped. “Don’t feel too bad, Percy. Just because you aren’t smart enough or talented enough to land a secret, important project doesn’t mean you aren’t smart or talented. You just aren’t as smart or talented as I am.”

            Perceptor was dumbstruck. Of course Brainstorm was involved. There was a top-secret, morally dubious experiment entailing the sparks of creatures whose sentience and existence had long been denied; it seemed impossible, in hindsight, that Brainstorm would _not_ be in charge of it. Whom else could have been expected to handle such a matter, besides the two mechs he had already been aware of?

            He must have been visibly shaken, because after Brainstorm left, Greenlight put a firm servo on his pauldron. “I know what my deal with him is, but what the frag is yours? Besides the fact that his input is about as essential as a scraplet in your olfactory sensor…”

            She received no response. After a few kliks of surveying his faceplate, she caught on that it was something that could not reasonably said aloud without fear of backlash, even if hidden behind a layer of verbal code. This was not something they could just subtext away and discuss later, and maybe that, at least, gave her a sense of the gravity of what Brainstorm had involved himself in.

            And, well, now Perceptor had a sense of where Deluge’s and Jhiaxus’ project stood with the Council.

            “The scraplet just wants to get to you,” said Greenlight, trying to steer their conversation back to safer ground. “I’d say let him pretend you’re jealous if I didn’t think that would make him even more smug and annoying. I’ll see to him.” Meaning she would keep him informed if she discovered anything about his bigger project.

            “Thank you.”

            After break, Perceptor continued collecting and comparing the existing studies about corrosive ailments, but it felt like his processor was divided. He wondered if he had a remote control probe lying around from a previous experiment, something he could pilot through the vents for a hint of Deluge’s and Jhiaxus’ work, but the only one he could remember was owned by the lab and had needed to be returned. He wasn’t even certain that he could get away with placing something in the vents without being caught.

            It was then that he remembered the scanner Greenlight had given him. He kept it in a compartment on his frame rather than in subspace to make it easier to pull it out without being seen. Common wisdom was that optics were everywhere, but now he could find out to what extent.

            If Perceptor assumed that it meant he could find a work-around with his probe problem, however, he was in for a rude awakening. Every corner of the room was bugged, leaving every inch of his office covered. He calculated the probable radius of each camera’s view in his helm to double check for potential blind spots, but he couldn’t predict a single one.

            Defeated, he finished up his proposal, submitted it, and prepared to move on from the labs. He belatedly realized that he hadn’t made a plan for the sol’s lesson with Moonracer, but he kept a few topics on reserve for cases like this one, where work kept his processor too busy for nearly anything else. He selected one at random and continued to Uraya as usual.

            But nothing that sol, it felt like, would agree to remain normal. The state of the House of Illusia was a precise inversion of the norm: whereas it typically kept a cool, tight, controlled atmosphere even while packed with servants, it instead looked chaotic and abandoned. The gates were thrown wide open, and as he stepped inside, he was surprised not to find Hound tending the gardens for once.

            Perceptor might have shaken it off with the presumption that Hound had merely been excused early for the sol were it not for how quickly the front door was flung open when he knocked and the slightly manic look in the maid’s, Scour’s, optics when she answered. Her expression immediately fell flat upon seeing him, disappointed. “Is Lady Moonracer ready for her lesson?” he asked lamely.

            Scour lifted an optic ridge at him. “You didn’t hear? The brat’s gone missing.”

            For a moment, he only stared at her, trying not to gape. How could she be so bold as to speak of her masters’ youngling like that? Surely, it was just frustration over the situation or something. She couldn’t really presume that her words would go unnoticed otherwise, he was certain. “Missing? For how long?”

            She shrugged. “Since several joors ago? Disappeared sometime after she met her conjunx-to-be, Whatshisname. _Aubade_.” Scour rolled her optics. “Probably has the same wild tastes as her bare-spark of a Carrier.”

            Now Perceptor was definitely slack-jawed. Scour had progressed from making a mild pejorative about a noble’s youngling to outright insulting her masters, openly calling Lord Mirage adulterous and Moonracer, by extension, illegitimate. “E-excuse me?”

            “Oh, you haven’t heard?” Her optics lit up, obviously delighted to have a new audience for her gossip. “Everyone with a processor has known for stellar cycles that Finesse couldn’t have sired a sparkling. Mech as cold as that _has_ to have been budded herself. No, Mirage had to have kindled his brat with someone else, and best bets are on Hound.” She laughed, fanning herself with a servo. “Little Moonie probably ran off with some poor mech to have little no caste sparklings of her own.”

            Perceptor drew up his pauldrons and gave her a stern look. “Lady Moonracer hasn’t even had her first upgrade.”

            “But she’s getting close enough, isn’t she?” Scour asked rhetorically.

            The maid continued jabbering on, but Perceptor’s processor had already begun tumbling along its own path. He found himself haunted with the old adage about sparklings from two caste once again, and that brought him to thinking about Lancer and Greenlight and the scans they were being put through over the concern about “no-caste sparklings.” Moonracer had never been that important in his function—prominent, yes, and not _un_ important, but not as overarching as some of his other concerns. Now, regardless of whether the rumor of her siring was true or not, she was completely inseparable in his processor from his worry for his friends.

            Perceptor darted in the first direction he felt compelled and scanned everything around him for any sign of the missing youngling, ignoring Scour’s indignant cries until they faded into the distance.


	4. Protecting Your Best Asset

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perceptor has a pleasant chat with the director in charge of his experiment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That feel when a chapter doesn't go exactly where you want it to (but still helps establish some important things).
> 
>  **Edit 1/31/16:** This chapter has gone through minor revision.

            Running was probably useless. Mechs with vehicle modes could move faster than he could even while they were driving at a slow pace, and Perceptor was attracting looks from the Urayan locals. If Moonracer had been taken, he never had a chance to keep up. If she hadn’t, he was only making himself look like a fool.

            However, he couldn’t brush aside that chance that she was running away. She didn’t have her wheels yet, and his legs were longer. If she left recently enough and if he’d picked the most reasonable direction for her to run, he could potentially catch up to her. He could reason with her, convince her to come back for her creators’ sake, even if not for her own.

            His processor kept being invaded with urban legends, Moonracer now preplacing the generic younglings he had always imagined before. Shadowy mechs sneaking into the grand house to snatch Moonracer away. Moonracer being dragged into the depths of Cybertron where she would never be seen again. Moonracer screaming as her coding was purged from her frame.

            Perceptor only began to slow when he saw Lords Mirage and Finesse ahead of him. They were facing each other, with Mirage hunched over and Finesse holding his faceplate in her servos. She appeared to be whispering something to her conjunx, and Perceptor presumed it must have been words of comfort. His steps faltered, indecisive whether to approach or to give them some privacy.

            But Finesse had already spotted him, and she beckoned him over. Mirage straightened up and schooled his faceplate into something more steady and stoic as Perceptor approached. Perceptor pretended not to notice the bereavement and desperation that had been clear in Mirage’s expression before.

            “I am certain you have heard about our sparkling’s disappearance,” said Finesse.

            “Yes, I—” What was he supposed to say? That he ran over there like a mad mech because he heard a rumor that Moonracer was illegitimate? That her potential illegitimacy reminded him of a mech from the Intellectual caste? Even if what Scour said was true, telling the nobles any of that was bound to incite offense, not relief.

            “I believe I may be able to help locate her,” Perceptor stammered instead. “With a few internal recalibrations, I believe I might be able to convert my lenses for use as a telescope. I could scan the streets from above for any sign of her.”

            “You don’t have to do that,” said Mirage. “The Enforcers are already searching, and you probably have important experiments to look after.”

            “My experiments can wait until tomorrow, but Lady Moonracer cannot. I can remain here fairly late without jeopardizing my work.”

            “You would do that for my daughter?” Something about the way Mirage said _his_ daughter sent a pang through Perceptor’s spark.

            “Yes, I would. I cannot allow myself to fall into inaction when an important mech could be in danger. I will alert you the moment I find anything.”

            Mirage dismissed him from the conversation with a nod, and Perceptor took off to find a building he might have roof access to. From there, he popped open an access panel and started tinkering with his settings. The process was more dangerous without proper lab equipment and a medical professional, but a brilliant scientific mind like Perceptor’s could manage.

            Once adjusted, he transformed and began examining every path from his vantage point. He spotted an overturned table with evidence of a struggle, but following the potential routes from there led to either a dead end or completely peaceful streets without any sign of disturbance. He tried again, searching down another path and following the possible branches from each possible mark of trouble. All of them led him nowhere.

            By nightfall, Perceptor still hadn’t made any progress, and he was beginning to grow restless. He was beginning to contemplate taking the next solar-cycle off from work to keep looking when he received a sudden notification on his comm.-link: _Moonracer was returned to us._

            It was a strange message. The phrasing made him believe that Moonracer had been taken, otherwise it would say she _returned_ , not that she “was returned.” It was possible that she had merely been located and escorted home, but if that were the case, wouldn’t they have said that she had been “found,” not “returned”? And if she had been taken, who had taken her, and why had they returned her so quickly?

            Any further inquiry on his part was only met with refusal, so he resigned himself to going home without answers. That didn’t stop the curiosity from plaguing him. It was difficult to comprehend why everything was happening at once, from Lancer and Greenlight growing tense with each other to Brainstorm’s experiment to Moonracer’s disappearance. If he could tie them together neatly with a line, maybe it would make sense. But as a scientist, he knew it could not be as simple as that. Even if they were connected somehow, it had to be through a much more complex web of interactions.

            Engaged as he was with his thoughts, it wasn’t until Perceptor came out of recharge the next solar-cycle that he remembered to readjust his settings again. He had left them in an unnatural setting for long enough that his plating ached and that he had to wait for his systems to reorient themselves before he could continue with his routine.

            When he made it to the labs, he was stopped before the first turn to his office by the biology department head. “Excuse me, Perceptor,” he said, “But I would like a word with you in my office.”

            He led Perceptor in the opposite direction down the hall and let him into a dimly-lit room with three chairs in front of a broad desk. Perceptor could see little of the room because of the lack of light, but what he could see appeared crowded, but neat. Everything was organized in perfect ninety-degree angles, down to the smallest piece.

            “Have a seat,” the department head directed. Perceptor sat in a hard, uncomfortable chair that made him immediately yearn for the ergonomic one in front of his primary computer. He expected the department head to take a seat behind the desk, but he didn’t. He stayed by the door as it swished closed, plunging the office into greater darkness.

            “I heard that you were causing a disturbance for a couple of my scientists,” he said, tone chipper. “You walked in on a closed experiment. Nearly compromised their research.”

            Perceptor hesitated. There was no pretending this was about anything other than Deluge and Jhiaxus, and there was no use in denying his actions. The only course available was to downplay the severity of his discovery. “I was merely walking passed their door on my way to the library. I may have lingered too long, but I couldn’t see their subject matter. I may have been curious, but such is the duty of the Intellectual caste.”

            “Curiosity killed the photovoltaic pussycat.”

            It was said without malice, but it still sent a chill up Perceptor’s spinal strut. “I will try to keep it from getting out of servo, then.”

            “You’d better. You’re a microscope. I would hate for that enhanced vision to show you something better left unseen.”

            “Understood.”

            “Good. After all, this one came down from Zeta Prime himself.” Perceptor heard pede-steps behind him, but the department head remained outside his field of vision. He had the overwhelming urge to turn back to look for him, but tension kept him looking forward as the department head continued speaking. “You wouldn’t want to get in the way of something like that, would you? Not after how generous his policies have been for your friends and your own research…”

            Instinctively, Perceptor’s plating tightened around him. The department head’s tone still hadn’t strayed from the cheery, conversational one he had started with, but there was a threat in his specific words. The otherwise disarming voice put Perceptor more on edge because of it. It was even worse when he couldn’t feel a thing in the mech’s E.M.-field. Perceptor was doing all he could do just to appear calm.

            “I read your research proposal, by the way,” the department head said. “Corrodia Gravis. Dangerous material. Have to handle it wisely. It would be a nasty thing to get anywhere sensitive, and I’d think protecting your best asset would be the priority.”

            “Yes, sir.” That wasn’t it yet. Perceptor hadn’t been dismissed, so he knew there was still something else coming.

            The department head finally walked around to the other side of the desk and sat down in a swivel chair. He still had a smile on his faceplate, but his optics were narrowed, making him look like a razor snake assessing a glitch mouse. “One last thing before you go,” he said, digging into a drawer. He pulled out a datapad and handed it to Perceptor. “Your pupil disappeared and missed her lesson last sol, correct? The Council thought it was time for her to have a very important lesson, vital to every Cybertronian’s growth.”

            Perceptor’s spark could have stopped, even before he read the lesson plan. How could the Council have known about that so soon? And why, if it was just her disappearance, were they bothering to dictate a new lesson plan over it? If it was more than that, on the other servo, why were they only giving a new lesson?

            Unless it wasn’t about Moonracer at all. If they had heard the rumor of her siring, they would have started an investigation or done something about it already. No, this was probably meant as a statement for _Perceptor_ , specifically. They wanted to send him a message: _Watch your step; we are watching your every move_.

            Perceptor powered on the datapad to see what lesson his salvation costed. When the screen activated, a brief history of the planet and an outline of the caste system glared up at him. He had to hide his disbelief. The department head stared expectantly at him, so Perceptor said, “I believe this will be manageable.”

            “Good. You really should consider yourself lucky, Perceptor. No one else could ask the Council themselves to take time off their busy schedules to manage their job for them. You should be grateful they care so much.”

            The department head let him out not long after, and being thrown into the much better lit corridor after sitting in the dark for so long was more dizzying than forgetting to reset his personal systems had been. Perceptor staggered back to his own office, but by the time he reached it, he realized that he had no idea what to do. The warning about handling his research material could have been anything from implicit approval of his study to a veiled threat. Possibly both. There wasn’t a vocal or visual cue he could have gone off of.

            Perceptor decided to check his computer. If it had been intended, in whole or in part, as an approval of his study, he would probably have a new message confirming it. There it was in his inbox, sure enough. Epidemiology Study: APPROVED, with notes from the biology department head.

            After the conversation they had just had, Perceptor was dreading checking the notes. But if notes had been sent back, it probably meant required adjustments, nothing so different that he would have to completely change his research subject, but things he would be required to find work-arounds for nonetheless. When he scanned through what those adjustments would be, however, he found that most of them were changes to his planned sample areas.

            What was perplexing about these restrictions was that a few of them were places with high documentation of Corrodia Gravis. For the most part, he wasn’t barred from the whole geographic region, just specific sectors of that region. He wasn’t sure why so many of them lined up with military bases, but if it was only limited to them, he could have ignored it as disruptive to training maneuvers or too dangerous for one scientist to handle.

            The sectors that _didn’t_ align with military bases were more curious. The area immediately surrounding the Hydrax Canyons, perhaps, were blocked because of their proximity to potential Insecticon habitats. But that did not explain why the Manganese Mountains, of all places, had been blocked off as well.


	5. Between What Feels Right and What Feels Safe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The lesson doesn't go as well as expected, and Perceptor has to pay the consequences. Violently.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you _are not_ planning on reading _For All That Has Happened_ , ignore the following notes.
> 
> If you read through chapter 7 of _For All That Has Happened_ before reading this, don't skip the lesson scene in this chapter; the narration is different.
> 
> If you read this before reading chapter 7 of _For All That Has Happened_ , feel free the lesson scene in _that story_ and just be aware that the lesson here has plot significance for both stories.
> 
>  **Edit 1/31/16:** This chapter has been revised. The above note still stands, though.

            Perceptor spent time on the shuttle to Uraya trying to collect himself and relax his plating. It wouldn’t do to let Moonracer see his apprehension during their government-mandated lesson. More importantly, if he didn’t bundle his own emotions back up, whoever was keeping track of him would notice and report his behavior. He couldn’t let that happen until he figured out how to make them relax their surveillance over him.

            Moonracer was already waiting for him when he reached the room set aside for their lessons. Such an occurrence was rare enough alone; she usually had to be led there from wherever she was playing before Perceptor arrived. But when he stepped into the classroom, he could feel a completely different atmosphere from usual. It was serious and charged, as if the air itself was determined to make this the liveliest lesson yet.

            His student, too, seemed changed. Moonracer was sitting upright in her seat, not leaning over, and was following him with a focus he had never seen from her before, even during the lesson on elective kinship. Perceptor didn’t know where she had gone or what she had seen when she disappeared, but whatever it had been seemed to have matured her considerably. It left him in a state of awe and concern for her.

            “Shall we start, then?” he asked, mostly for his own benefit. He needed to steel himself for the speech he was about to give.

            “In the beginning, there were two groups of cybernetic life on this planet: warlike Combatrons, created by Unicron, and peaceful Cybertrons, created by Primus.” Not that he actually believed in Primus or Unicron, and not that he believed that there were only two types of personalities that could be divided neatly across racial lines. If he could teach this on his own terms, he wouldn’t start with the mythology; he would start with the facts and frame the mythology as the fiction it was.

            “The two races lived in harmony for a time,” he continued. “The Combatrons’ greater physical prowess made them ideal construction workers and city guards. The Cybertrons, meanwhile, we more suited to design and administrative duties. They could split the work between them and create a perfectly functioning society together.

            “But, over time, the Combatrons began to wonder why they should live as equals with the Cybertrons at all. They valued strength over all else, and they knew that they were far stronger than the Cybertrons,” he said, which was true, but a massive over simplification of the factors that lead anyone to war, not to mention cutting out several important events leading up to that decision. But there was a script he was expected to follow, and there was safety in following it. “In their processors, their greater strength should have given them the exclusive right to rule. In the night cycle, they schemed. Then, one sol, they made their attack.

            “The Cybertrons were taken by surprise, and many of them were slaughtered in the first few solar cycles. Those that survived barricaded themselves in their homes or hid underground until the Combatron rampage calmed. When they came out of hiding, however, they found the outside world completely devastated, and the Combatrons enslaved them to rebuild everything.

            “For vorns, the Cybertrons labored and toiled, unable to defend themselves from the brutality the Combatrons unleashed on them if they did not work. They suffered, but they were not broken. After working, they spent their limited reprieves between work shifts learning and improving themselves. Then, at long last, counter attack arose. The Cybertrons fought back against the Combatrons and retook the planet. The Combatrons were put in their place, and the planet was renamed Cybertron after the heroes.

            “This was not the last war Cybertron saw, however. For vorns and vorns, stretching out all across Cybertronian history, there have been cycles of war and oppression, war and restoring peace.” Oh, how Perceptor wanted to get into each of those cycles in more detail. If this was meant to be anything other than a prolonged introduction to what he was supposed to be teaching her, he would have taken advantage of Moonracer’s lengthened attention span to just explore all the intricacies of Cybertron’s political revolutions. But, unfortunately, he had to leave it at, “It is the most recent of these wars that began the caste system that maintains society as we know it.

            “Because the Combatrons have proven themselves countless times in our history to be little more than drooling, mindless ruffians,” nevermind that tactical genius existed and that Strika remained, to that sol, one of the most famous figures in their history for both her military might and brilliance, “three castes were created to suit their programming. For those that showed enough judgement that they could plan and create safe dwellings, the Constructive caste was created. Beneath them, for those that were too dangerous to be trusted but showed just enough cognitive function to strategize, they were classed as Combative. Then, for the wildest and most dim-witted, they were given over to the energon mines so that their strength and physicality might be put to use.”

            He watched Moonracer’s faceplate shift expressions, her optic ridges scrunching in a look of deep contemplation, as though she was analyzing the information he’d been forced to feed her. Perceptor realized he had grown accustomed to barreling through their material and that, perhaps, he probably ought to give her opportunity to speak for once. “Do you have any questions for me, Lady Moonracer?”

            Evidently, she needed no more encouragement than that to start asking everything on her processor. “Why is Unicron called the ‘Unmaker’ if he _made_ the Combatrons? Are Seekers Combatrons or Cybertrons? How can there be Seekers in both the Combative and Ruling castes if all Combatrons are mindless and battle is distasteful to Cybertrons? What was the planet called in the past if it wasn’t always Cybertron?”

            Perceptor found his optic-ridges rising before he could stop himself from reacting. It was one thing for her to ask so many questions when he was only expecting one; it was another for her to ask questions with more complicated answers than he was allowed to give. Thankfully, they were still within the realm of questions compatible with the script. He set down the datapad with the lesson on it, barely noticing he’d done so, and said, “Well, the existence of Unicron and Primus are debatable to begin with. They are important religious figures for some and an apt metaphor for the very different natures of Combatrons and Cybertrons. Cybertrons create; Combatrons destroy.”

            “Then why are Constructives a Combatron rank?” she replied without a beat.

            “Combatrons have a physical strength that most Cybertrons lack, that makes them more suitable for moving support beams and walls,” explained Perceptor. Then, trying to reclaim control over the lesson, he said, “Back to your previous questions, Seekers have always been a bit of an enigma for Cybertronian society. Some say they were created by Unicron, but stories say that Primus favored them. Others claim that Primus created them, but that Unicron corrupted some of them. In reality, it is merely a strange matter that non-Vosians are not privy to. As for the previous name or names for Cybertron as a planet, they have been lost to time.

            “Now, because Cybertrons are more suited to a wider variety of duties, there are five castes to contain them. In ascending order, they are Servile, Creative, Intellectual, Noble, and Ruling, with the sole Prime at the very top.

            “The division between Noble and Ruling is a mere formality: nobles may make decisions over a business or smaller area whereas the ruling caste makes decisions for polities or the planet as a whole. Nobles and rulers may bond and join as conjuges freely, and there is a fluidity of rank between the two castes. Even an Elite Guardsmech may rise to the stature of King.” He shouldn’t have been as scared by Moonracer raising her servo as he was, but he had no idea was she was going to ask next. The only thing he feared more is what might happen if he denied her an answer. “Yes, Lady Moonracer?”

            “But don’t the Elite Guard have to fight?” she asked. “Why aren’t they considered Combative?”

            Perceptor’s first thought was of Lancer. His second was of the stereotypes about Combative caste—stereotypes he had fed her and was expected to enforce. He couldn’t help but be offended by the connection. At the same time, he didn’t want Moonracer to stop engaging with the material. He didn’t want her to ask questions too complicated for the lesson he was supposed to give her, but he didn’t want her to lose interest in learning so soon after she’d found it. The only paths forward were to answer her questions or to completely shut her out, and he was caught between what felt right and what felt safe.

            In his indecision, he just stated talking, and he only hoped what he was saying was the correct choice. “Because the Combative caste is purely for pointing in the direction of an enemy and unleashing. Allowing such reckless and uncivilized mechs to guard Cybertron’s greatest is asking to doom the planet. The Elite Guard may only be drawn from the most refined, level-helmed, well-trained mechs available.” It was the answer that was most flattering to his friends, and it was the answer that would satisfy the Council, but it made his glossa feel heavy.

            Worse, it was not the answer that would satisfy Moonracer. “Then why aren’t Elite Guardsmechs drawn from the scientists and philosophers?”

            “Because scientists and philosophers, by and large, are ill-suited for battle. The Elite Guard is its own brand of programming that allows them to balance fighting for the protection of others and reasoning—like determining what is a threat and what isn’t. I can think of only one instance where a scientist was allowed to enter the Elite Guard,” he said, and that scientist had been on his processor the whole time, “and she is the exception.

            “In general, however, mechs remain in the caste they were sparked for. Mechs are placed, at creation, in the function their programming suits. In the Servile caste, this means merchants, skilled workers, nobles’ servants, low-rank enforcers, and City Guardians. In the Creative caste, this means painters, writers, actors, holofilm makers, customizers, and their ilk. The Intellectual caste, meanwhile, includes scientists, philosophers, medics, and high-ranked enforcers.”

            By that point, Perceptor could begin to predict when the questions would come and what they would be about. Moonracer’s attention was too acute, too sharp for him to work around. In some ways, her optics on him were more chilling than any authority figure’s. With the department head, it didn’t matter what Perceptor thought as long as his words and actions were all according to prescription. Moonracer wanted to lay everything bare: the truth of his knowledge and suspicions, every lie, every bias, every secret and outrage he had shared in privacy with Greenlight and Lancer. She wanted no room to hide.

            And maybe only an innocent youngling, with no idea of how the system worked or what it was capable of, could demand that of him.

            Which is why, even if he could signal her to stop without being obvious or overstepping bounds, Perceptor knew what Moonracer’s next set of questions would be. “Why is there such a large gap between the ranks of Enforcers?” she demanded. “Shouldn’t they all be part of one caste with leadership determined by seniority? Or maybe just one caste away from each other, instead of two?”

            In response, his answers became more desperate. Where he should have answered that things were the way they were because of the wisdom of the Prime, he instead answered, “There’s nothing creative about a low-rank Enforcer. An Enforcer’s _duty_ is to be uncreative unless they have the authority to presume to know what a criminal is thinking. They don’t belong in the Creative caste.”

            Which prompted her to reply, “A high-ranked Enforcer does have the authority. So doesn’t that make them creative?”

            Thus, they began a faster rhythm of difficult question and flimsy response. “In a sense, but a high-ranked Enforcer still doesn’t _create_. They _reason_ , hence their placement in the Intellectual caste.”

            “But a low-ranked Enforcer and a high-ranked Enforcer are both still Enforcers. Shouldn’t they have the same programming?”

            “No, though they will have similar programming. A high-ranked Enforcer's successor will be obvious from a batch of commissioned low-ranked Enforcers because they will rise above the performance of their peers. However, their time serving in the lower caste and on the streets teaches them valuable lessons for their later function in the higher caste.”

            “I still don’t understand. There are castes, and they’re unshakeable, except that they’re not. Mechs don’t jump caste, unless they’re nobles, Enforcers, or some lucky scientist. Shouldn’t that be impossible if everyone is placed where they’re programmed for? And where does that put someone like you?”

            “What ever could you mean?” Perceptor asked, feigning cluelessness.

            Moonracer was having none of it, but she explained her point carefully. “You’re a scientist. An Intellectual. But you transport in to teach me, _under the service of nobles_. Doesn’t that go against your caste placement?”

            “Tutoring you is an activity I take on the side of my work. I am not under your creator’s employ full-time. They attain my services through their wealth and reputation, as well as my own delight in spreading intelligence,” he rationalized. It wasn’t a lie; he enjoyed having someone to share his knowledge with, but it felt like a hollow form of the truth in that moment. “I am certain it was not your intention to undermine my work, Lady Moonracer, but please be more mindful in the future.”

            But their momentum was unstoppable now. Perceptor and Moonracer fed on each other’s rising panic, reaching new crests with each turn in the conversation, rolling up a higher hill of fear that could only end in a horrible crash. “I just want to understand. If everything is so set by function, if everything is perfect and simple, why are there exceptions?” asked Moonracer, her pitch increasing. “Why does everyone get so freaked out over a little friendship?”

            Perceptor had no idea what she meant, but that was the moment that it all clicked. It was foolish for him to presume this lesson was solely about him or solely about her. He had been handed this personally selected lesson for both of them, and probably for everyone in the blast zone of their potential misconducts. Why would the Council possibly target one mech when they could send a message to many at once without ever pulling out anything bigger than a datapad?

            It was also the moment of their inevitable collision, the wreck they had been building towards the moment he stepped into the room and felt a change in the air. In his terror, he gripped her by her pauldrons and looked dead into her optics. “Don’t question this,” he warned her. “Don’t question any of it. Don’t question the High Council or Zeta Prime. If you value any of us, just accept history as it is given to you.”

            Slowly, it dawned on him that his reaction was precisely the worst he could have had. Not only did he allow her to see his fear, but he shattered the illusion that following the government was something you did because it was right and good, not because you had to. Worse still, by laying a servo on a noble under any context other than saving her life, he had breached a barrier of physical conduct.

            Perceptor let go as if burned and made distance from her seat, reconstructing his lost aura of cool restraint. “My apologies, Lady Moonracer,” he said, trying to pretend he could undo his mistakes. “I don’t know what came over me.”

            To her credit, Moonracer looked a little startled, but she seemed to be recovering faster than he was. “It’s okay, Perceptor,” she assured him. “I’m sorry I pushed too far.”

            “Not at all, Lady Moonracer,” he said, and he hoped she would realize this mess was primarily his fault. When he felt the flow of his vents near stabilized, he picked up the datapad and told her, “I believe we shall stop there for the sol. We shall pick up with more recent history next lesson and begin on Astronomy if we have time.” Assuming, that was, he would be allowed to teach her again after that disaster of a lesson.

            Perceptor had the entire flight back from Uraya to pick apart the lesson and evaluate what had gone wrong. Everything felt like a mistake, from the moment he had entered the classroom to his final misstep in grabbing Moonracer. And Moonracer…when had she become so astute and attentive when he had fought for so long just to have her listen to his lessons? What had inspired that change in her? Would someone soon be upon her to “teach” her the error in her line of questioning, or would the blame lie solely on Perceptor? The stretch of the joors on the shuttle only gave his fears more time to torment him.

            The biology department head was waiting for him in the station when the shuttle landed. He had that same perpetual smile he maintained in his meeting that morning, and Perceptor allowed himself, if only to distract himself from the growing dread, to wonder if the mech’s faceplate had been constructed not to make any other expression.

            “Come with me, Perceptor,” the department head said. He wrapped a surprisingly tight grip around Perceptor’s pauldrons and started pulling him away. Perceptor considered kicking the mech and making a run for the next shuttle set to take off, but his frame wasn’t built for fighting, and he knew that even if he managed it, the Enforcers would likely be on his trail before he had gotten his bearings and found a place to hide. If he cooperated, at least he could hope for a less severe punishment.

            Together, they went to back to the labs, down the fifth corridor to a stairwell to the basement. From there, the department head led him to a key pad, where he typed in a code and made a secret door open. Inside was another set of stairs, leading so far down that Perceptor couldn’t see where they ended. The department head pushed him forward, onto the narrow stairwell where they could no longer fit side by side.

            Now, Perceptor couldn’t have run if he’d wanted to. The department head was blocking the way back up, and he had no idea what lie in wait for him down. For all he knew, he was being led to a dead end, where he would be pushed off into the depths of Cybertron, to splatter against her core. He could be fed to an Insecticon being prepared for the next experiment. With a processor as intelligent as his, he could think of a million possibilities that made risking it without more information unwise.

            They eventually reached a level so dark that the only source of light Perceptor had was the glow of his own optics, and the only idea he had of where to go was from the steady push of the department head’s servo on his dorsal plating. A door at Perceptor’s side suddenly hissed open, and it made him jolt in surprise. He didn’t have time to recover from his shock before he was thrown, helm-first, into the room.

            “Oh, Perceptor,” cooed the department head. “With a mech as accomplished as you are, I really expected better.”

            As he spoke, Perceptor could hear him walking around in the dark, but he couldn’t see the department head’s optics, and he couldn’t seem to tell which direction the mech was walking. He could only calculate the direction of the mech’s motion by the movement of a magnetic field trapping his arms and legs, one by one.

            “You should have been intelligent enough to follow simple orders. Then again, mechs so rarely live up to their reputations, don’t they?”

            The vision in Perceptor’s right optic started to go, like it was being blocked out by something. When he felt pressure right against the lens of his optic, he understood why. He started to squirm, trying to get the metal tube that was slowing pressing into his faceplate out of his optic, but the magnetic field kept him in place. “No, no, please!”

            “Still, I really expected more from you, Perceptor,” the department head continued as though he hadn’t heard the pleading. “You’ve always had such promising ideas…”

            “Please,” Perceptor tried one last time before the glass of his optic was crushed in, and then all he could do was scream.


	6. Steady Beep of Machinery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perceptor wakes up in medical care and makes an unexpected connection.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Edit 1/31/16:** Revised. Thus ends my sudden editing spree. *bow*

            Perceptor booted up with what felt, in a manner of expression, like the most massive helm ache in Cybertronian history. It was the kind of pain that made him wonder if he had attempted to get some heavy equipment off a high shelf and dropped it on himself. Everything felt heavy and clouded, between his lethargic movements as he pushed himself into a sitting position and sluggish thoughts as he tried to figure out his situation. His HUD threw error reports at him, but he couldn’t focus long enough to make sense of them, so he dismissed them.

            He had no idea where he was, and looking around, he realized that he had no vision in his right optic. At first, he thought that maybe it had failed to power on when he awoke, so he tried sending a signal to that optic. It came back with another error message: DISCONNECTED. Perceptor frowned at that, wondering if maybe a wire had been jostled loose when he hit his helm.

            A memory file suddenly opened, unbidden, and poured data into the forefront of his processor. Pieces of video were jumbled together, the lesson with Moonracer folding into descending through a darkness he didn’t know the bottom of collapsing into his first meeting with the biology department head buckling into the moment of terror when he realized he was completely, utterly helpless. The memories fragmented like his optic, cracking in and pieces chiming against everything in their path as they fell.

            _His optic shattering._

            Perceptor finally started to focus enough to recognize his surroundings as the sterile, grey, plastic-coated trappings of a hospital room. It was about that moment that a startlingly red and shiny mech strutted into the room. “Ah,” the mech said, “I see you finally decided to rejoin the functioning. I must say, that _is_ a nasty hole you have there.”

            Whoever this mech was, Perceptor wasn’t sure what to make of him. He was examining a datapad, but his flashy finish and sleek alt.-mode made it unlikely that he was a medic. At the same time, Perceptor had no idea what the mech would be doing in his room if he were not an employee of the hospital.

            The mech, perhaps reading his confusion, said, “Yes, I know it can be a little overwhelming to meet a medic as stunningly handsome as myself, but I _am_ a professional. Knock Out, at your service.”

            Perceptor suppressed his skepticism at the sound of the designation. Even in Cybertronian, it was a name that held the dual meaning of aesthetically-pleasing appearance and forcing others into unconsciousness. Neither definition was particularly promising for a medic. Perceptor did find the former meaning admittedly apt, but he certainly hoped that the latter was only true in the sense of using anesthesia on surgery patients.

            “Unfortunately, we’re short on replacement optics to fit your frame type at the moment,” Knock Out said as though oblivious to his patient’s reaction, though perhaps he had noticed and elected to ignore it. “The socket has been cleaned out for glass, energon, and infectious material, and the connective wires have been capped and deactivated to prevent uncomfortable electric shock until a replacement can be crafted for you.

            “In the meantime, you have an optic patch to prevent contaminants from entering the socket,” continued Knock Out, jabbing a stylus in the direction of his faceplate. “If you experience any discomfort or fluid discharge through that area, please report it immediately. And please, keep staring with your good optic. I know what a wonder this chassis is.” He smirked, clearly pleased with himself.

            “Thank you,” Perceptor said, at a loss for what else to say. Knock Out obviously knew what he was talking about, but his casual manner and egotism were off-putting. He did wonder what the official story behind his injury was, but Perceptor doubted he could think of a safe way to ask Knock Out without earning himself a few more processor scans. “By chance, do I have any visitors waiting for me?” he asked, more to fill the silence than anything else.

            Knock Out answered, “She’s in with another patient at the moment, but she said she would stop by when you booted up. Let me finish up here, and then I can send her in for you.”

            Perceptor startled at the news of another patient. He remembered returning to Nova Cronum before his optic was taken, so the only mechs could imagine would be there were Greenlight and Lancer. Had one of them fallen ill or been injured? How severe was it? Was it a coincidence, or had the Council discovered something about them as well?

            Which begged the question of how they had known about his failed lesson with Moonracer so soon. He knew—the moment he realized he lost control—that the Council or some authority would find out about what he had done, but he did not imagine they would be waiting for him when he returned. Perceptor presumed he would at least have one night-cycle in his own home before they came to deal his punishment.

            If there were cameras in the nobles’ home already, then there would be far worse secrets for them to have caught onto than Perceptor’s transgression. Likewise, a spy would have had to have been well-enough established to avoid suspicion, and any mech placed in the home sufficiently long would have heard a number of dangerous rumors. That left only the possibility that Perceptor himself had carried in the offending device.

            The datapad the department head gave him came to his processor immediately. Perceptor hadn’t kept track of it at the time, busy as he was with more pressing matters, but he thought about it more intensely then. He had it in his servos at the start of the lesson, and he placed it on a table around the time of the first question. Perceptor’s spark jolted with fear when he thought he might have left it there to risk putting Moonracer in more trouble, but then, he remembered putting it in his subspace before he left.

            As soon as Knock Out left the room, Perceptor fumbled for the spy-tech scanner and was relieved to find it still on his chassis. He almost opened his subspace immediately, but then another chilling possibility occurred to him. What were the chances that his loss of an optic had been utilized for a more permanent security feature? Still trying to maintain his calm, Perceptor ran the scanner beam over his patch and remaining optic. The negative result relieved him.

            Next, he pulled out the datapad and scanned it. Sure enough, there was an indicator of a covert mic and remote transmitter inside the casing of the datapad. That left him with what to do about it. He had promised his friends to leave any spy-tech he found, but losing his optic left a bitter taste on his glossa for letting the Council do whatever they pleased. To intentionally dismantle the datapad might be going against his friends’ wishes, but perhaps if he just let it slip…

            Knock Out walked back in just in time to see the datapad crash against the ground. The mic and transmitter skittered across the floor next to his pedes. Perceptor watched horror stretch across the medic’s faceplate. Then, expression growing firm, Knock Out stomped down on the device, smashing the last of it to pieces. He scooped up the remains of the spy-tech and looked at Perceptor. A jolt of understanding passed between them.

            “I would be more careful with my reading material if I were you,” said Knock Out. He walked over to an incinerator chute and dropped the mic inside.

            “It can be difficult to ignore certain recommendations,” Perceptor replied, “especially when a superior at the lab is making the recommendation.”

            Knock Out hummed and pressed a button to summon a cleaning drone for the rest of the datapad debris. “How do you feel about Dead End’s philosophy?”

            The question was obviously posed with a sense of meaning or code that Perceptor wasn’t privy to. Without that context, he elected to simply tell the truth. “Dead End is excessively pessimistic, both about the universe and in regards to other mechs’ aptitude for reason, but I can’t find myself disagreeing with his assessment of authority and the right of leadership.”

            It took willful ignorance to overlook the criticisms of the current government in Dead End’s work. Oh, he was always careful not to say something like, “Zeta Prime is a fraudulent hack,” outright. Dead End was too intelligent for that. But when he expressed disbelief in the Will of Primus and started prodding at the flaws in every official record, a mech would have to force themselves not to think about the implications of Dead End’s words.

            Maybe for that reason, Knock Out was satisfied with Perceptor’s answer. The medic nodded. “Well, I can’t blame him for his cynicism. I know what it’s like for mechs to ignore your achievements because of the care you give your frame.” Knock Out sniffed as though offended by the very thought. “Being smart doesn’t mean you can’t care about looking good.”

            Perceptor felt a small twinge of guilt for his initial assessment of Knock Out. He was right about the mech’s egotism, but he misjudged his processor too quickly. “For what it’s worth, I appreciate being placed in your care for more than your aesthetically-pleasing finish.”

            Knock Out grinned at him, a smile that exuded genuine delight and gratitude, not simply self-centered pride. Perceptor was seized by the startling red glow of his optics.

            Red optics. Such an odd color for a medic to have. Huh.

            Greenlight walked in on what Perceptor supposed must have been a strange scene. The odd sense of comradery that had formed between him and Knock Out filled the room, morphing the atmosphere into something too soft for the average hospital room. The cleaning drone was still dutifully sweeping up shards of datapad, beeping out a cheerful, pre-programmed tune as it rolled along the floor.

            Her faceplate said she wanted to question it all, but she didn’t say a word until she was right next to Perceptor. “Is everything okay?”

            “Better than I could have expected,” said Perceptor. He lifted a servo to his patch until Knock Out tutted behind him. Suddenly, Perceptor remembered what Knock Out said about Greenlight being there for another patient. “Where is Lancer?”

            There was a worrying pause before Greenlight replied. “Lancer was wounded in the line of duty.” She fumbled around in her subspace. “There was an assassination attempt on a visiting member of the High Council, and…” Words failed her.

            When she pulled out a datapad, Perceptor snatched it out of her servos. Greenlight looked at him quizzically until he started to scan it with the detector. Her optics went wide. Knock Out stepped up behind them and watched over their pauldrons. Anticipation hanged over them, and they all sighed in relief when the scan came back negative.

            Greenlight took back the datapad and pulled up a grainy video. A set of Elite Guardsmechs stood around while the Chancellor of Nova Cronum welcomed the Council’s Ratbat to their polity. Barely a moment after their servos broke away from the other’s, the first shot—a miss—flashed across the screen. Lancer threw herself in front of Ratbat, taking the second shot. As she fell, the third shot hit her in the abdominal plating.

            Knock Out narrowed his optics. “That’s strange…” He reached over Greenlight’s pauldron and rewound the video. He made a noise when the first shot was fired. “Well, it’s possible that our wannabe assassin isn’t the best shot, but…”

            “Hold on,” said Greenlight, rewinding the video one more time. She and Perceptor paid closer attention to where the shots landed. The first missed Ratbat by a wide margin. The second hit Lancer on her pauldron right before she reached him. The third shot landed squarely in the center of her frame, dangerously close to her spark chamber.

            Greenlight’s E.M.-field flared out over them, sizzling with anger and worry. “I have to get back to my conjunx _now_.”

            “Greenlight—”

            “Go,” interrupted Knock Out, servo latching onto Perceptor’s pauldron. “He isn’t cleared to leave yet, but I’ll see what I can do.”

            “You don’t have to tell me,” she said, and then she was out the door.

            Knock Out’s grip on his pauldron tightened. Perceptor reached up to loosen his servo. “Greenlight doesn’t handle strangers well,” he explained, “but she’s grateful. I promise.”

            “I can’t say I blame her,” said Knock Out. “If I had a conjunx, I probably wouldn’t be the nicest mech to deal with when their spark was on the line.” He walked over to the wall and pressed the button for a mounted comm. “This is Knock Out requesting clearance for patient 09261985 to leave his room. He needs to walk around and stretch his joints.”

            “Approved,” said the distorted voice from the other end.

            With Knock Out’s assistance, Perceptor stood from the berth and started down the hall. He had to lean against Knock Out while he was getting used to the lack of depth perception and adjusting to being back on his pedes, and that earned a few protests about the medic’s paintjob, but they eventually started making real movement.

            When they reached Lancer’s room, however, the door was blocked by another medic. “Sorry, but he can’t come in,” they said. “Visitation is limited to mechs with legal connection to the patient at this time.”

            “He’s a friend of hers,” said Knock Out. “Can’t we make an exception?”

            “He’s not registered as an amica endura; he can’t come in.”

            “My patient is under a lot of emotional duress, can’t you tell?”

            The medic blocking the door looked at Perceptor. He was certain his naturally stoic expression was working against him. Even though he normally kept his E.M.-field drawn tight to his frame, he let it expand over the medic so they could feel his overwhelming concern. They didn’t seem impressed.

            “If he’s not a registered amica endura or spark relative, I’m not letting him in.”

            “Please,” said Greenlight’s voice from somewhere inside the room, “let him in. Lancer would want to know he’s here.”

            The stubborn medic turned to look inside, and Perceptor got a glimpse inside the room. Greenlight was seated by the berthside with her servo gripping Lancer’s. Lancer’s frame still had color, but that was little comfort when it was so much duller and greyer than usual. The fact that Greenlight found any part of her conjunx to hold onto under the mass of cables and tubes Lacer was hooked up to was a miracle. The steady beep of machinery was the only sign that Lancer was stable and in position to make improvement after the damage she had taken.

            “If he doesn’t have a registered connection to the patient,” the medic repeated, “I cannot _legally_ let him into the room.” For the first time, their faceplate softened into something sympathetic. “I’m sorry. If you leave your comm.-signature with me, I’ll let you know the moment she can accept your visit.”

            Perceptor had found his bearings enough to make the walk back to his room without Knock Out’s assistance, but Knock Out stayed close, in case he lost his equilibrium again or the loss of depth perception became too much of an obstacle. When they were safely behind closed doors, Knock Out said, “I’m sorry I wasted your time bringing you out there.”

            “No, you couldn’t have known—”

            “That your friend, who was shot twice, would be in too critical condition for visitors?”

            He couldn’t disagree with the logical counterargument that simple statement provided, but he felt the need to reassure Knock Out all the same. “I doubt that anyone’s first reaction to an emotionally-charged realization is to sit back and contemplate the issue.”

            “Unless, of course, that someone happens to be Dead End,” said Knock Out. The two of them burst out laughing, even though the comment wasn’t funny enough to warrant their hysterics. But what else could they do after the sequence of events they had just experienced? Something had to give after all the tension that had built, so two intellectuals found themselves falling over each other.

            “At least I can rest assured that any would-be assassins will be stopped without a ‘legal connection’ to Lancer,” said Perceptor when they calmed down again.

            “So you would hope,” said Knock Out. “Listen, I’m going to give you my comm.-signature. You should consider yourself very lucky; I don’t normally do that unless a mech at least bought me a drink first. Unless something suddenly goes horribly wrong, you’re going to be out of here before your friend wakes up. I’ll keep an optic on her in case there are any legal loopholes for the wrong mechs to find.”

            “I believe there’s another matter you could assist me with right now,” said Perceptor.

            “Keep this up, and you’ll owe me one massive favor down the line, but I’ll bite. What else could I possibly do for you?”

            “Considering your distaste for my earlier reading material, would you happen to know a better source for datapads?”

            “Would I ever.” Knock Out smirked, and then he began to tell of a shady merchant who knew exactly where to find information on anything and everything.


	7. The Mech Who Seeks Knowledge All Over

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Perceptor follows up on some advice from his doctor.

            Peptex was off limits. Peptex was exactly the kind of place Perceptor was not supposed to be. But if anyone consulted the official shuttle records, they would see that Perceptor never went to Peptex; he went to Iacon. What they wouldn’t see was the hidden entrance in the back of an independent medical practice that he took into the underground tunnel system leading into Peptex.

            From there, Perceptor tramped his way to the market hotspot of the city. Peptex’s greatest markets were dustier than he’d come to expect from larger cities, but it was expected when the city was in one of the harshest climes the Rust Sea area had to offer. The stalls were structured to direct the wind away, creating a shielded cavern for customers to stand in, while still allowing some of their more attractive wares to be seen from a distance.

            Perceptor was greeted by stunningly bright gems blinking out from singing stalls. The sting of acid in the air kept the scent of refreshment from traveling well, so merchants had to catch attention with sight and sound alone. There were artisan pieces encrusted with rainbows of gems, from pyrope to almandine, topazolite to melanite, hessonite to demantoid andradite. Hydrogrossular accessories hung from the fronts of stalls like curtains. Some just presented unshaped hunks of forsterite. Above it all, cacophony reined as competing merchants tried to attract buyers by playing symphonic vaporwave over their neighbor’s tranceabilly.

            The merchant Perceptor was looking for was identifiable, as Knock Out had told him, by the carving of a grim face on the side of his stall. The mech in question looked lot more cheery than the carving, but as the distance between them closed, Perceptor perceived more predation in that look than welcoming. The name Knock Out provided him, Swindle, suddenly made more sense.

            “How can I help you?” asked Swindle, barely glancing at Perceptor’s optic patch. His fingers drummed rhythmically on the counter before him. It was probably meant to complement his casual slouch—or perhaps the muffled wheelie pop from the next stall over—but it spoke of impatience to Perceptor.

            “I’m looking for some new reading material, and I was advised that you had the best.”

            Swindle’s smile stayed exactly the same, almost as if frozen, as he replied, “Whoever told you that is obviously a mech of taste. But you aren’t from around here, are you?”

            “Perhaps not, but where is the mech who seeks knowledge all over really from?” replied Perceptor, giving the coded response.

            “They would have to be from everywhere at once, I reckon,” said Swindle. “I think I have exactly what you’re looking for in the back. Why don’t you step inside?”

            Perceptor entered through a small side door while Swindle stashed his cash register in subspace. Beyond the assorted waxes, polishing cloths, hood ornaments, replacement parts, and strange knickknacks visible from Swindle’s storefront, there was a surprisingly spacious storeroom. Swindle led him past cloaks, mods, and strange substances Perceptor had never seen before to a small section of datapads. Displayed prominently was a work written by someone with the assumed name Megatronus and promoted by Dead End.

            “That’s the best seller of my rare and unusual tomes,” said Swindle, “but having celebrity endorsement will do that. Please, pick as many as you like. We’ll talk price afterwards.” As much as Perceptor wanted to interpret that as an offer of a discount for a certain number of datapads, somehow, that seemed unlikely with a designation like _Swindle_.

            There were some fascinating tracks in Swindle’s collection. There were factual records Perceptor wouldn’t have expected to see outside of the polity they referred to: death records for Kaon, reports of an escalating energon shortage in Blaster City, police brutality in Polyhex, and on. A few contained philosophical works, though the only one that caught his curiosity was the one by Megatronus. He had to wonder what the mech had written that could have captured the praise of someone as supercilious as Dead End.

            Then there were the stories, some more polished than others, many written in a vernacular he didn’t recognize but could still decipher. The tighter-written ones, Perceptor noticed, had names attached—often Dead End or some mech named Soundwave—though from the variance of styles, he supposed these denoted editorial roles rather than authorship. Just from scrolling through the first couple of pages of each datapad, the stories varied from an off-beat retelling of _The Clever Turbofox_ to bizarre, experimental, linguistic somersaults.

            Selecting from the collection proved more difficult than Perceptor had been anticipating. He only had so many credits budgeted for datapads in the first place, and then he had to consider what he would be able to transport back to Nova Cronum without rousing suspicion. Subspace pockets weren’t often searched, but between his recent punishment and the security frenzy their polity had been thrown into after the assassination attempt, he felt that he was almost assured of a search on his return trip.

            Swindle hovered over Perceptor’s pauldron, and that constant smile was starting to remind him of the biology department head. Perceptor shuddered involuntarily and pressed a servo over his optic patch. Sensing his discomfort, Swindle backed off and waited for Perceptor to calm back down.

            “If you’re having a hard time deciding,” said Swindle, “I have just the alternative for you.” There was something in his voice and demeanor that almost seemed disappointed, and Perceptor clung to that to keep himself calm while Swindle disappeared into the maze of his hidden wares.

            When he returned, he brandished a set of datapads and announced, “These are a little more discreet than your average datapad. Hack-proof, durable, reusable…You can download any of the datatracks here remotely, if you know where to find the right network.”

            “Fascinating,” Perceptor found himself saying. Most datapads were single-use, either pre-programmed with specific tracks or designed only for a single download, only able to be reused if the original file was lost permanently. The ones programmed for Dead End’s _Tenets of the Dusk’s Lucidity_ were considered revolutionary for their ability to update every time a new essay in the series was released. Datapads beyond that capability had to have Perceptor’s admiration, and that’s when a thought occurred to him. “Are they only compatible with the datatracks here, or could they be used to procure other documents?”

            “Anything you’re willing to risk your neck-cables for.”

            He began to understand why Swindle was reluctant to present the blank datapads first. The datapads with the documents already on them were more lucrative; all one would be able to do is obtain the track already downloaded onto the pad. With the improved datapads, one could download a track, transfer it to a normal datapad, then use the superior datapad to continue downloading new tracks ad infinitum.

            But the blank datapads still offered something to be gained in sale. If all they could do was seek out copies of the tracks already available, there would be little incentive, but with the capability of putting anything a mech could find on a hack-proof device, they became more attractive.

            “I’ll purchase three.”

            “Will that be all for you?”

            With his processor cranking over idea after idea on what to do with this new tool, Perceptor knew he would be taking on a few new technological projects in his spare time, which meant a material requirement. Glancing around Swindle’s shop, he started piecing together his resources. “Actually, there are a few essentials you could provide…”

            His caution was well-founded, as it turned out. On the return trip from Iacon, Perceptor was indeed subjected to a subspace search. The guard in charge of it raised an optic ridge at the presence of car parts, but said nothing and motioned Perceptor away with little fuss.

            Back at his apartment, he laid out everything on his berth and started wrenching apart everything but the datapads. As he worked, he made a list in his processor of his favorite datapads from his library. Perceptor separated everything from his work out until he could see every component available for him to work with, sorting multiples into distinct piles. Then, he started rewrapping wires and screwing together pieces until he had an EMP generator about the size of his servo.

            He knew he had only one shot at what he was about to do. Perceptor was setting himself up for retaliation enough as it was; if he were to fail, a second attempt would only worsen the punishment he wrought on himself. He steeled his nerves, hid the generator as well as he could on his frame, and headed for his personal library.

            Perceptor knelt near one of the shelves and shuffled around his datapads as though searching for a specific one. He used the movement to disguise planting the generator and setting its timer. Then, he grabbed a datapad from his list of favorites and hastened out of the room.

            Within millikliks, he felt the wave just brush his E.M.-field. Better to have overestimated the necessary area than underestimated, he supposed, and at least his calculations were only slightly off on a piece he never had the chance to test, but there was still a moment of terror when he felt that wave brush him, a snap of a moment when he feared he had overestimated enough to take out the whole apartment.

            After setting down the rescued datapad in the safety of his berth room, Perceptor returned to his library and began scanning for spy tech. To his relief, it seemed that the gamble had paid off, and he had one less room held captive by surveillance. He took a moment to mourn the sacrifice of all the datapads he had obtained over the course of a vorn, and then collected an armful to take back to his berth room.

            Perceptor pried open one of the datapads he purchased from Swindle and began examining the circuitry within. He didn’t expect to individually rewire each of his old datapads to function precisely the same as the new ones, but he hoped to improve the security of the old ones—and add an extra layer of protection to both models if he could manage it. Primarily, programming them to only expose their content to specific mechs.

            There was little point in gathering information without the intent to distribute it. Keeping himself informed on those subjects the Council wanted hidden was enticing enough, certainly, but there was only so much one mech could do alone. Greenlight had to know what he did—and Lancer, once she recovered. Moonracer, too: as much as he wanted to keep her out of danger, he knew her curiosity could be their downfall if not handled properly. Additionally, the younger generations had to be educated for there to be any hope of change. He couldn’t afford to keep knowledge from any of them.

            He also couldn’t afford to let the information slip into the wrong servos. Perceptor got off easy when he lost an optic; it would only get worse if he was caught smuggling illicit information. Sealing the pads to respond only to specific frequencies seemed like a decent solution, but he kept remembering the conversation between Greenlight and Brainstorm he’d walked in on, when it seemed that Brainstorm was about to speak of something that could neutralize E.M.-fields…

            Neutralize them, but not copy them. Programming the pads not to respond to pressure without the signal of a specific E.M.-field seemed like a safe bet. He certainly hoped so.

            Once he achieved the security he intended, programming his own E.M.-field into the pads was easy enough, and he knew Greenlight’s and Lancer’s almost as well as his own, but Moonracer’s proved more of a challenge. As often as he’d seen the youngling, it still didn’t add up to the stellar-cycles of close friendship he shared with Greenlight and Lancer. Perceptor wrestled with his memories for a strong impression of Moonracer’s signal until the obvious struck him: the disaster of a lesson. It would take a pretty severe memory corruption to make him forget the details of their shared panic, and that one moment impressed the energy of her field pretty clearly on his processor.

            The work kept him up well into the night. His remaining optic strained, and his servos protested until they froze up entirely. His processor slowed. His whole frame felt like it was trying to filter tar through a pin-sized hole. When Perceptor finally set his work aside, his frame shut down instantly, well overdue for recharge.

            Despite how little recharge he got, Perceptor was becoming accustomed to running on low, between the demands of his superiors and those of his own processor. He would have appreciated a few more joors of rest, but between his hospitalization and his datapad quest, he had expended his off time for the deca-cycle, even as resistant as his frame was to calling the past couple solar-cycles a break.

            Before work, he made a detour for the hospital to meet up with Greenlight. He assured the mech at the front desk that he was not coming back to have his optic socket checked just yet, and they had him wait in the lobby. When Greenlight finally came out to greet him, she looked even worse than he felt. “Visitors’ chairs are not conducive to recharge,” she informed him.

            Any response Perceptor might have had was interrupted by a nearby screen broadcasting the morning news. _“Investigation is still ongoing regarding the targeted attack on Councilor Ratbat earlier this mega-cycle. Councilor Ratbat was fired on by a concealed sniper, as Chancellor Oversteer prepared to welcome the councilor to Nova Cronum. Councilor Ratbat was unharmed in the attack, but one Elite Guardsmech remains in critical care. The shooter has not yet been apprehended.”_

            Greenlight’s frame tensed, becoming stiffer with each word. Perceptor couldn’t decide what upset her most: the cover-up of the true target for the attack, not knowing who pulled the trigger, or Lancer’s complete anonymity, even as the supposed savoir of Councilor Ratbat. He nudged her gently, earning a glare. But Greenlight calmed enough to follow him out of the hospital before long, and they headed for the labs together.

            “How is Lancer?” he asked.

            “Alive. Her scapular joint was pierced straight through. The medics replaced it, but they didn’t get it in time to stop a petrollic infection. The other shot wound is patched, but we’re basically keeping it on with hopes and prayers.” She ran a trembling servo over her faceplate and shuttered her optics. “You know Lancer; she’s a fighter. I just don’t know if she can fight this.”

            Perceptor squeezed her pauldron. “I have the utmost faith in her survival. If she could wrangle an alloygator before her reformatting, I cannot conceive of her dying now.”

            “No one wanted her to _die_ when she wrestle that alloygator. No one asked her to wrestle an alloygator in the first place.” Seeing him open his mouth, Greenlight corrected, “I didn’t actually expect her to do it; I was still high on the Conjunx Ritus—Mechs _actually_ expect her to throw her spark away for Nova Cronum, Percy. If she lives through this attempt, what’s to say I won’t lose her next time?”

            She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, her whole frame slumping. Perceptor had never seen her so downtrodden. This was Greenlight, the mech who cut down foes with her razor wit and stared down mechs twice her size. Even with a bent audial and the Council breathing down her cables, she had spoken with a tone like acid rain. Hurt, cautious, but far from beaten. For the first time, Perceptor was seeing her defeated.

            He was waiting for the right moment to introduce the new datapad to her, but he wasn’t sure anymore that the right moment would come. When he made the plan to include her on his personal mission, he had counted on her ferocity. Handing the datapad to her right then would have felt like emotional manipulation on his part, asking her to join him in dangerous illegal activity when she was lost and vulnerable.

            Something must have projected through his E.M.-field, however, because Greenlight instantly straightened herself back out. Coolant tears pricked at the corners of her optics, but she blotted them away without a thought. “What do you have?” When he didn’t answer immediately, she said, “Come on, Percy, I’ve only known you your entire existence. I would know that buzz of uncertainty anywhere. You have either bad news or a gift.”

            Still hesitant, Perceptor retrieved one of the modified super datapads from subspace. Greenlight held out a servo and waited. After an uneasy klik, he handed it over. She turned on the datapad and stared at the blank screen. “There’s nothing on it,” she said, stating the obvious.

            “Nothing yet,” he replied.

            After another pregnant klik, Greenlight grabbed him by the forearm and started dragging him down the sidewalk. “We have to get to work. Gee, I can’t wait for another joyous solar-cycle spent locked in a room with Brainstorm.”

            Perceptor got the impression that, this time, she really did have something to look forward to in their collaborative project.


End file.
